~ Where fingers tap dance…

Kiss of love

It’s official: Kissing is not ‘our’ culture, the ‘our’ here being us ‘Indians’. Yeah, we Indians don’t kiss. Oh no siree, we don’t. That’s why all our movies used to have the mandatory scene of two flowers getting closer and closer till their respective petals touched (omg, the thrill, the ecstasy of that moment!). Each time the hero and heroine made faces at each other, did facial exercises, errr… sorry I don’t seem to get it right, were in the throes of what was supposed to be extremes of passion, the flowers had to step in and do their duty.

This was of course during ‘ancient’ times, my childhood and growing up years. The authorities/elders, the Keepers of Morality in Society (Golly, that sounds like something J.K. Rowling could have used in her books in place of the Death Eaters) thought that they could prevent us from learning about kissing. We grew up and found (too late, much to our sorrow) what kissing was all about and kissed and how, to make up for lost time. Not only that, we also found that they, the parents that is, had children not by immaculate conception as they would have us believe, the liars-by-implication, but by the normal biological way of humans by means of copulation. Shucks! Pure as the driven snow (not that we ever had seen snow), did they say? What a let down.

You don’t believe me? Then listen to this story, a true one at that, as told to me by a friend. This was in the dark ages, late 70s. Students in one of the medical colleges where my friend was also a student were learning the basics of ‘how children are born’. Nope, those days schools didn’t have ANY lessons on this topic, or colleges for that matter. But they could very well not keep such essential matters from those studying to become doctors, could they now?

So there they were, students of medicine, all 17 and 18 year olds, who were getting their introductions to the basics of sex or ‘how children are born’. Many in that class were aghast when they found out ‘how it is done’. In agitation, they asked each other, “Do you mean to say our parents did THAT?” Obviously they had to have, because weren’t they the living proof? But it still sent many of them into a state of shock imagining parents in all those kamasutra-ish poses. Some among the girl students even burst into tears when they realized how “dirty” their parents were, when all along they thought of them as pure lilies, never touching each other in such gross ways, only petal-to-petal as they showed in movies. The film world has a lot to answer to the common people.

Did that make you laugh? Don’t worry. The fun and frolic continues to the twenty first century. As recent as about 5 years back, Death Eaters… sorry, The Keepers of Morality in Society were insistent in spreading the illusion that their children were born by spreading a white sheet on the ground, kneeling on it (No, it is not what you think, such dirty minds you have, I tell you!), and praying. God it seems, did the rest.

Don’t look at me. I don’t know how HE did that, probably dropped the babies on their heads on the hard ground by the look things (Not all of us are such ‘divine’ beings though; some of us were conceived the ordinary way, through union between humans and birthed via the birth canal).

The problem is, the special delivery dropped-on-head-babies are all around wanting to intrude on personal space, brandishing the sword of ‘our culture’ of which they know naught (because when has culture ever been stagnant?). If these Keepers of Morality of Society in the present have their way, we’ll soon be back to the flowers-kiss-but-not-humans era, and that sadly so, will only be the least of our worries, their intrusions into and controlling of personal choices and lives being the worst.

Geez 😀
Few years back,when we were taught the lesson on reproductive system,our Biology teacher told us about a student who did not talk to her parents for a week when she realised they did “it” 😀
I hope things change for the better and it does not vanish into thin air after a few weeks.

Excellent write. What a hypocrisy. Pretending that sex never happens. All are lilly white. When some hapless teenager gets caught for a minor offence, all the adults who fornicate all night pounce on him/her with stern expressions and long advice, and shut the doors and fornicate again all night.

What can I say? We belong to the great land of civilization, Kamasutra yet we have such double standards. It’s so ridiculous. Guess, I came straight from the plane. Now, what does on say at such stupidity!!! This is how we educate our children, stifling sexual expression and it’s dangerous when they learn wrong conception about kissing and sex, show lack of respect for women.

You are welcome. I don’t think people of my parents generation ever held hands, or even stood next to each other other than for photographs. Some of the attitude has leached down to my generation too. One hopes for the next generation being more free to follow their heart.

Since I live outside India, I learned about these topics in 6th grade (standard) ! However I do admit it’s awkward to discuss this with your parents. I felt the school themselves did a great job stressing when its appropriate and unappropriate and the consequences it can have. Yea everyone’s parents have done it and when you get older, it’s obvious that the concept that ‘god’ sends babies from the sky has no logic nor does not make sense on how babies are born (since a woman has to be pregnant by the man !), so if you’re smart enough, you know that it’s complete bogus.

Sex is a taboo in Indian culture, however I do admit I find that the younger generation is finding things out like these much earlier and perhaps doing these behind their parents backs just to experiment. Also not just this topic, but also the concept of dating, even having male friends is taboo in Indian culture too, and now it’s funny to see how common it is !

Among the older generation too, they knew about sex quite early on (listening to the older ones among them talk. We never had the concept of not letting children eavesdrop, and children were privy to almost anything happening in the house in the conditions they lived in), though they try to pretend otherwise. They married and some of them had babies by 13 years of age. So why this pretense by them that they knew nothing and were so innocent while the young aren’t?!
As for children of today, how many parents bother to check the soaps and movies for inappropriate content? Almost none in India ever bother what their children watch.

Maybe true. Some of the channels the parents watch themselves the kids watch w/o the parents realzing it can have inappropriate content. Not directly related, but idk if you ever watched ‘Akkara Kazhchakal’ ( about a malayalee family and their life living in the US- it’s on youtube on the net if you want to watch), but there was one episode where the dad dragged the son to watch Asianet or something to learn Indian culture but when they turn on the channel it shows girls dancing in miniskirts ‘sexy style’ rather than ‘culture’. It later shows the son joining the dad to watch Asianet just look at the ‘hot mallu girls’ rather than learning ‘culture’ lol. It’s pretty funny-the show itself is very funny too !

Omg. How could I have forgotten the “every time a fairy blows its wee nose a baby is born” from dear old Madeline Bassett?! I am biding my time to hop over and devour your posts on my favorite writer ever. 🙂

ha ha…Shail…that was a damn good post ! Just saw that event in Kochi in the morning news and here, I come and read your post on that.
I love the other name for Death Eaters…you are damn good 😀
And the realization that your parents have also done that…it takes time to sink in ! I remember when I told my elder one abt sex and other stuff, all she could ask me was “So, you and daddy did it twice huh??” Even if I wanted to laugh out loudly, I just held it back and answered “Maybe ;)” to her ! But she was hardly 12 at that time…but that talk has helped us grow more closer to each other, where we share a hell a lot of things !

So well articulated! The Keepers of Morality in Society certainly did a good enough job did they not! What a sacred portfolio it was they had! Sadly, they seem to have lost it now! Sadly, for them that is 😀
Sadder yet, and it truly is, is the amount of effort those of that Society still undertake in schools, which I have been witness to. Right from dressing. We now have a dress code in school for teachers, who were earlier allowed to wear salwars to school if their students did not work that day, to NO SALWARS at all, even if a single student in school is in uniform. Sigh. Goddamn Sigh!!!! But then, those are rules, okay! The comments these same people pass on the kids’ dressing is even worse. even if they are in uniform! Their eyes and ears, it would seem are tuned only to their over version of sadaacharam!

That was a very amusing post, Shail! Loved it! Actually, I, too, was planning on writing about this kiss-wiss business that our moral police try to shut down, but then after reading your post, I realised I could never have done it as well as you!
I remember, when I was a kid and friends of mine told me about ‘it’ and how my parents had indulged in those ‘gross’ acts, I was dumbfounded! 🙂 It was a taboo topic, never to be discussed. Thankfully, my mum told me about menstruation, which again, I felt happened to women only in India! :)I laughed sheepishly later, when I learnt about the ‘facts’ of life!
Really, what IS the harm in kissing in public? People are jailed on even hugging in public, so, I guess, kissing should be thought about later, after the minds are broadened a wee bit, ya? 🙂

Hey Shail, what a hilarious post it is. you pointed towards the hypocrisy in our society so well, and the kind of language you write in is a pure delight to read.
BTW – I also posted about the same topic today .Please make it possible to visit.

Hahahaha, loved it. I didn’t know why Sidney Sheldon books were banned for primary kids in my(our ;-)) school, which of course made me buy them and devour every single one of them :P. Seriously they make such a big scene. I think PDA should be legal.

I remember making off with Anna Karenina, and reading it sitting behind the hibiscus bush when in 7th grade. Well, in a country that stands by watching a man hit his wife without turning a hair, they have the nerve to oppose PDA! The former has to be banned and the latter made acceptable, yes.

What the moral police need is a Massive education on Human Psychology. The rules are very simple, What you resist, persists ; What you force, breaks ; You need to care for the seconds and the hours take care of themselves(how you indoctrinate your children, for instance 😉 )

About this blog

When my fingers tap dance on the computer keyboard the results are either some tongue in cheek humor, a verse, a short story, a rant or sometimes mere rambling prose that goes nowhere in particular.... You'll find them all. So go ahead, take your pick and be bored to death!!

I believe

"Better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self.” ~ Cyril Connolly

The why

“I write entirely to find out what I'm thinking, what I'm looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want and what I fear.” ~ Joan Didion